Genesis 3:15

ViaCrucis said:

As I understand it, the interpretation that the serpent as a malevolent and rebellious creature, aka "Satan", is foreign from contemporary Jewish thought.

It is, however, the ancient Christian view, and has its roots in 2nd Temple Period Judaism. While in post-Temple Judaism there isn't this idea of a "Devil", that idea is present in 2nd Temple Judaism.

The idea of rebellious and malevolent fallen angels, who have a leader, is a common theme in 2nd Temple Jewish literature. For example in the Book of Enoch there are angels known as "Watchers" who disobey God, their leader is known as Samyaza, in other works we find mention of a lead fallen angel named Samael, and Sataniel. This idea of fallen angels in 2nd Temple Jewish literature is highly influential on Christianity which emerged in the first century during the 2nd Temple period out of 2nd Temple period Judaism. So Christian writings, most obviously those which make up the New Testament, make frequent commentary about the existence of antagonistic and malevolent spiritual forces, using the Greek words daemon ("demon") and diabolos ("devil"). The New Testament also uses a direct transliteration of the Hebrew ha-Shaytan as "Satan", from the few cases of where that word is used in the books which Christians call the Old Testament, such as the book of Job.

It is also in 2nd Temple Jewish literature where the idea of the serpent in the Garden of Eden being this malevolent spirit, Satan or the devil, first shows up. A prime example of this is a first century work known as the Life of Adam and Eve. This work expands a lot on the Genesis story, and explicitly conflates the serpent with Satan, and mentions several encounters between Adam and the Satan (the serpent).

This is why Christianity, from its inception in the first century, has understood that serpent of Genesis as a reference to Satan, a fallen angel. That it is the devil that tempted and seduced Adam and Eve and, through their disobedience, brought them out of a state of peace and life with God into a state of estrangement from God; where sin and death have robbed them of their joy and life and has become a curse into which all human beings--and indeed--all creation now suffers.

It is within this context that Christians have seen in the statement made that the seed of the woman would bruise the serpent means that an offspring of Eve would destroy the power of the devil. So we read in that the victory of Jesus (whom we believe is the Messiah) over sin, death, hell, and the devil by His death and resurrection. So we are reading that passage in Genesis through the lens of what we believe about Jesus, through the lens of a Christian belief in and about Jesus of Nazareth.

And why would we locate Jesus there? Intrinsic to a Christian understanding of what Christians call the Old Testament is that these books are, ultimately, about Him. This is based on Jesus' own teaching and words, "You search the Scriptures because in them you believe you have eternal life, it is these which bear witness to Me." The Christian view of Scripture is that it is ultimately Jesus-centric. That Jesus is the Messiah, and so we read these books Messianically, in some cases that is because there was already a messianic interpretation at the time of certain passages; and in other cases it is because we have consistently been searching to find Jesus in these books. It is an intrinsic and essential aspect of Christian biblical interpretation: These books are ultimately about Jesus, that is an article of Christian faith: The Bible is always about Jesus.

That is how we get to that interpretation.

-CryptoLutheran

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This is MY interpretation (below), from a plain reading of the text, & from taking the evidence of other verses into account. If you read the text plainly, & dont have to make huge illogical assumptions, then you are more likely to come to the CORRECT interpretation. If you need to twist everything to fit Jesus into it, you are probably butchering the true meaning. No Jewish person reading this text would have come to the conclusion that it is about the messiah, so it can not be a prophecy. It has only been interpreted this way AFTER the fact.

The below is totally MY interpretation, not from a Rabbi or anybody else.

If you look at all the other verses in the Old Testament that support this verse, you will NOT come to the conclusion that Genesis 3:15 is about Jesus destroying Satan. You have to IGNORE all of the other verses if you want to cling to this conclusion.

If we look at Genesis 3:1:
"Now the serpent was more crafty than any of the wild animals the Lord God had made. He said to the woman, “Did God really say, ‘You must not eat from any tree in the garden’?” "
This is a description of the original form of the animal that is in genesis 3:15. It makes it clear that this is an ANIMAL, that God made when he created the other animals in genesis. It doesn't say anything about this being a fallen angel, that was previously in the heavens, like Christians believe that Satan was.

In Genesis 3:14:
So the Lord God said to the serpent, “Because you have done this,

“Cursed are you above all livestock
and all wild animals!
You will crawl on your belly
and you will eat dust
all the days of your life.

This is describing the condition of this animal AFTER it has been cursed, which is what we see in SNAKES today. This does NOT match the description of Satan in Job, where Satan is described as an Angel who roams the earth. It does not say in Job that Satan crawls on his belly. It also makes it clear in Job that Satan & God are on speaking terms. They are not arch enemies in Job.

Genesis 3:15:
And I will put enmity
between you and the woman,
and between your offspring[a] and hers;
he will crush[b] your head,
and you will strike his heel.”
This verse states that God will put enmity between Eve, & THIS particular serpent (so Eve & THIS Serpent will hate one another for the rest of THEIR days). THIS snake will die, just as Eve will die, as it is a mortal snake.

God ALSO puts enmity between Eves offspring (all of her descendants, which is all of mankind) & all of the serpents descendants (which is all of the snakes we see today). As far as I am aware, Satan had NO descendants.

The fact that god refers to only Eves seed in the above passage, is because god is only talking to Eve & the Serpent. He is not addressing Adam in this verse. it has nothing to do with a virgin birth.

The word "he" as in "he will crush your head" is just a collective term for all of eves descendants. You will often see the term "he" in Jewish scriptures to describe nations & tribes.

We also have Genesis 49:16 & 17, which uses very similar language when describing a snake:
Genesis 49:
16 “Dan[h] will provide justice for his people
as one of the tribes of Israel.
17 Dan will be a snake by the roadside,
a viper along the path,
that bites the horse’s heels
so that its rider tumbles backward.

There is no way that you can imply that the above 2 verses are about Satan.

There is NOTHING in the old testament to suggest that this is a prophecy about The Messiah. You have to jump to unfounded conclusion after unfounded conclusion to reach this interpretation. A prophecy is useless if you can only read it into the text AFTER the fact.

Bobber said:

And you do know Lilith you've likewise have got to be prepared to listen to just why Christians see it that way. To me anyway it's very, very clear. God right from the beginning from after they committed sin imparted into their minds they ultimate hope that the snake being a type of Satan was going to be ultimately defeated. If God didn't say anything Adam and Eve would be in absolute despair. You might say but it's very vauge.....IT WAS MEANT TO BE VAUGE....and not too clear.......but it was enough for Adam and Eve to know

the new enemy who wrestled their Dominion from them would truly meet his defeat by a new man....that would be through the seed of the woman Eve albeit down somewhere in a family line coming from her. But this man would be the Son of Man Christ. And this man's victory would become humanities victory . But revelation was progressinve. Years went by and eventually lambs were used as sacrifice of sins....but still a type......Not fully explained what it all meant but they knew it would be revealed the why of this eventually.

Then more revelation occurred. Another piece of the puzzle....John the Baptist proclaimed, "Behold the lamb of God which takes away the sin of of the world!" Jn 1:29 Still not clearly and absolutely revealed what it meant but they were moving the right direction to eventually get it. Well if the lamb was sacrificed as a substitute of sin....and Jesus was called the lamb of God.....then they were getting close to an understanding. So why the mystery.....because God was orchestrating it to take place but if Satan had known the fulness of what it all meant he and his forces would not have sought to circuity the Lord of Glory.

“Which none of the princes of this world knew: for had they known it, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory.” 1 Cor 2:8

As for me I''ll say again. That verse in Genesis you quoted is very clear looking back what it all meant. But it was kept vague at the time for the reason stated in this post.

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The thing that really frustrates me as a Jewish person is that I DO listen to what Christians have to say, but they then REFUSE to listen to what I have to say about the subject. Apparently Jewish people are not allowed to interpret their OWN scriptures. It comes across as extremely arrogant, because they presume that THEIR interpretation is the CORRECT interpretation, & that anybody else who interprets it differently, HAS to be wrong.

Yet it is obvious to me that the majority of Christians who make claims about prophecies about Jesus in the Old Testament have never read the verse themselves & just come up with the idea that a certain passage is a prophecy of The Messiah. They are always TOLD by another Christian who was told by somebody else that a certain passage is about the Messiah. They then just run with this idea, never having studied the entire chapter that the passage is from to make sure that they are understanding it correctly, & assert that it is a prophecy about the Messiah.
Christians are interpreting passages as being about Jesus AFTER the fact. A prophecy is only useful if it predicts something BEFORE it happens. I doubt that ANYBODY could have used Genesis 3:15 to predict Jesus BEFORE the stories of Jesus came out in the 1st century A.D.

eleos1954 said:

Often the explantion (or futher information) is given in a few verses before or a few verses after. Also much of prohesy is in symbolic language. Also use of a concordence is helpful.

Here is a free resource you can use that is very helpful ...... www.biblehub.com

In Genesis 3:15

15And I will put enmity between you and the woman,
and between your seed and her seed.

Seeds do symbolize lineage ... but also the women symbolizes the church (this becomes apparent after further study)

In the verse you provided God is saying this to satan, and is depicting a great strife that is going to take place, but that strife will
be ended by someone (He) .... (prophecy of Jesus to come) through the lineage of Adam and Eve.

He will crush your head,
and you will strike his heel.

The He (a person) will crush the serpents head (satan)

and you (satan) will strike his heel.

Telling us there will be a great (strife) between the two .... but ultimately the "He" will defeat the serpent by crushing his head. That is the serpent will ultimately be defeated. (this is a prophesy of the coming of Jesus)

15And I will put enmity between you and the woman,
and between your seed and her seed.

Through reproduction (seeds) a great enmity (strife) will occur. That is ... between the followers of Jesus and the followers of satan.

Go here and look at the concordance .... not all will apply 100% but many will .... and see if it helps you understand better.

Genesis 3:15 - The Fate of the Serpent

The truth of HIs Word is scattered throughout the Bible .... it's like putting together a rather large "jig saw puzzle" ... but as you keep studying
the "puzzle" starts forming a more complete "picture".

May the Lord guide all of us in understanding His Word. Amen

Keep studying and more knowledge will be gained to better understand many things.

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Please see my reply to another person on this: Genesis 3:15

2PhiloVoid said:

You're right. Some folks really don't know how to read the Bible. But that's typical with much of humanity. Not everyone has the same access to scholarly resources, and not everyone has the same comprehension skills for reading (or hearing) everything and anything they come across, even when they're sitting in a high school classroom studying Shakespeare. We all need teachers to help us expand our hermeneutical acumen.

Of course, where the Bible is concerned, some issues are simply concealed in cryptic language and we all have to wrestle with it; none of us will be able to completely figure it all out.

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Here is the full reasoning as to why i interpret the verse the way that I do here: Genesis 3:15

I did not use any scholarly resources, OR ask advice from any Rabbi. This is just the interpretation from a plain reading of the text. If you have to do fancy somersaults in order to interpret the text, so that it comes out with the meaning that you WANT it to, so it suits YOUR theological understanding, then you are corrupting the bible.

There are texts in the bible that are difficult to understand, & you may need help to understand them correctly, however the person helping you to interpret it has to be able to point to supporting passages in order to SUPPORT the interpretation. Not just come up with interpretations that suit your theology, & that no normal person would come up with, if they were not told how to interpret it.

The Old Testament (Hebrew Tanakh) is also stand alone. You can not use passages from the New Testament in order to interpret the Old Testament. That would be like a Mormon saying that you have to use the Book of Mormon to interpret the New Testament. I am sure that no Christian would agree to this, so as a Jew, I dont agree to Christians using the New Testament to interpret the Tanakh.

d taylor said:

Well i have have been wrong about the capitalizing in Genesis 3:15 but below is correct about Genesis 4:1

It is because of Genesis 4:1
Genesis 4:1 in the original states this.

וְהָאָדָם, יָדַע אֶת-חַוָּה אִשְׁתּוֹ; וַתַּהַר, וַתֵּלֶד
אֶת-קַיִן, וַתֹּאמֶר, קָנִיתִי אִישׁ אֶת-יְהוָה.

The original Hebrew states.
And the man knew Eve his wife, and she conceived and bore Cain, and said, “I have acquired a man:Jehovah.”

Eve would not have stated this in Genesis 4:1, if she had not understood Genesis 3:15 as a promise of a Messiah God

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All of the English translations translate the verse as something similar to "I have acquired a man with the help of the Lord"
All Eve is doing is thanking God for helping her to give birth to a son, just as religious mothers today will often do when they give birth to a child.
There is nothing in this verse to suggest that she saw the child as a promise of a Messiah. Again, you are making a tall leap to come to this interpretation. The simplest & correct interpretation is reading the verse plainly, as it is written. You are reinterpreting the verse to inject Jesus into it. You are also interpreting it AFTER the fact.

Bobber said:

Hold it stop right there! Paul the Apostle who wrote 2/3rds of the New Testament WAS Jewish and he said everything about what I was saying in my last post. And he being Jewish in all his travels went to the synoogog's first to proclaim Christ as the Messiah. Some received. Other's didn't To those who didn't he shook the dust from off of his feet.

But when the Jews saw the crowds, they were filled with jealousy, and they blasphemously contradicted what Paul was saying. Then Paul and Barnabas (now remember they were Jewish) answered them boldly: (Jews they were talking to) “It was necessary to speak the word of God to you first. But since you reject it and do not consider yourselves worthy of eternal life, we now turn to the Gentiles.

So you want only a Jewish person to interpret the scriptures? Well you have two here Paul and Barnabas. It just so happens though that they have trained US with their teachings.


But if it's true they are it's true they are. Now there's different degrees of what's absolutely clear and what can be considered somewhat speculative. But certainly not on important issues.

Possibly. But such doesn't mean they don't have a brain in the heads to look at scriptures and make their own assessment. I've done that and know that Jesus is the Messiah.

But they didn't need to know all the things about how Jesus would become the Messiah. From early Genesis they just believed and took God at his word that he's got this. The victory for humanity would come .

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I am not saying that just because I am jewish that I know how to interpret the old testament. I have to be able to JUSTIFY MY interpretation, just as a Christian has to be able to justify THEIR interpretation. I am not saying that I AM RIGHT, & that the Christian is WRONG. What i AM saying however, is that if the Christian can not JUSTIFY their interpretation, (& most cant, they are just making an assertion that a particular passage is about Jesus) then how can they assert that THEIR interpretation is correct, & my interpretation is false?
I have given a complete rundown of how & WHY I interpret 3:15 in reply to another poster. Why dont you read it, & then tell me why MY interpretation cannot be correct, & that the Christian interpretation has to be the correct one?


I also dont interpret the jewish scriptures through the New Testament. the Tanakh stands on its own just fine WITHOUT the New Testament. Claiming that a Jewish person needs to read the new Testament in order to understand the Old Testament, is like a Mormon claiming that you have to read the Book of Mormon in order to understand the New Testament.

Bobber said:

I agree with you there. There's nothing in chapter 4 which should lead one to believe anything about a Messiah. She and Adam knew though from chapter 3 that God's got this. That's all they needed to know.

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There is nothing in Jewish thought when Genesis was written that suggests anything about a Messiah that will redeem Adam & Eve. The idea of a Messiah is a much later concept. There is nothing to suggest in Genesis that Adam & Eve thought that mankind will one day return to the garden. Again, without justification, you are injecting Christian thought into the story.

Clare73 said:

Have you read the gospels of Luke and John?

The OT is to be understood in the light of the NT, which fulfills much of the OT, which fulfillment is necessarily "after the fact."
In the light of NT teaching from the apostles of Jesus of Nazareth, whose teaching is authoritative to the Christian church (Lk 10:16), we will better see to what many things the OT was referring.
It is only in the light of the NT that we know the Messiah did not have a human father, that he was born of a virgin, that he came to defeat Satan, that he was murdered by his enemies, etc.
In that light, we see to what Ge 3:15 was referring.



Did not Ge 3:15 predict Jesus' victory over Satan (serpent)?
Did it not predict the enmity between Jesus and Satan, between their two seeds (spiritual descendants), those (re)born of the Spirit of Jesus and those who reject Jesus?

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Why are you asking me to read the gospels of Luke & John. They have nothing to do with Genesis 3:15.
If you want to see my full critique on Genesis 3:15, click the link below:


I also dont interpret the jewish scriptures through the New Testament. the Tanakh stands on its own just fine WITHOUT the New Testament. Claiming that a Jewish person needs to read the new Testament in order to understand the Old Testament, is like a Mormon claiming that you have to read the Book of Mormon in order to understand the New Testament.

Clare73 said:

Did not Ge 3:15 predict Jesus' victory over Satan (serpent)?
Did it not predict the enmity between Jesus and Satan, between their two seeds (spiritual descendants), those (re)born of the Spirit of Jesus and those who reject Jesus?

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NO, it didnt. Please explain HOW you come to this conclusion, from the OLD Testament texts? What OTHER texts support your assertion that this text is about Jesus & Satan, & not about mankind's reason for disliking snakes?

If you are going to assert that this passage predicts what you claim it does, you have to be able to show your reasoning as to how you came to this conclusion. When I did exams at school, I always had to explain my reasoning as to how I came to the conclusion that I did, so the teacher knew that I understood what I was writing, & not just parroting somebody else's work.

Clare73 said:

How do you see the NT relating to the OT?

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Unless it can be shown that Jesus actually was who Christians claim that he was, i dont see it relating at all. If you cannot prove that Jesus actually was prophesied in the Old Testament, then I cannot accept that Jesus was the Messiah, because he did not fulfill the only prophesy in the Old Testament that would PROVE that he was the Messiah.

Did you look at my reasoning for interpreting genesis 3:15 by as I do by clicking the link, & critique it?

Here it is again in case you missed it:

Clare73 said:

Oh. . .I misunderstood your "being new to Christianity" to mean you were a new Christian.

My response to you was from that perspective.

I do not expect anyone who rejects Jesus of Nazareth as the Messiah to be able to understand anything Christian.

So it is not surprising when one does not.

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I could use the same excuse to fob people off who are not Jewish & make the claim that I don't expect anybody who is NOT Jewish to understand anything about the Old Testament. Yet here you are claiming that you do. I asked if you could critique my reasoning for interpreting Genesis 3:15 as I do, & you have made no attempt to do so. Does that imply that you can find no fault with my reasoning, so now you just want to fob me off to avoid answering what I wrote?

d taylor said:

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I am not talking about the English translations, I plainly stated, in the unaltered Hebrew verse 4:1 states Eve says i have acquired a man Jehovah. English and Jewish Bible translators have added with the help of The Lord

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They have translated it that way because that is the best interpretation of the text. Early Hebrew did not have all of the nouns that is in use in the English language today. If you reinterpreted the original Hebrew into English without some of the filler words we have today it would be incomprehensible to most. If you are asserting that the original authors intended it to be interpreted the way you are interpreting it, then you are saying that all the experts are,wrong which brings into question most of the English bible translations, not just on this verse, but many, many others. Which interpretation will be correct, only the ones that support your world view?

Aussie Pete said:

There are many references in the NT to the "seed". They refer to the seed of Abraham, who is the Father of faith.

Passages such as Galatians 3:16, Hebrews 7:10, Romans 9:8 may help you.

The reason why Christians believe that the "seed" in Genesis 3:15 is Jesus is that Jesus indeed crushed Satan's head when He (Jesus) rose from the dead. Satan did not know for sure who Jesus was. He did not know who the "seed" would be when God put the curse upon him. Hence he incited Cain to kill his brother Abel. No one could identify the "seed" until Jesus rose from the dead. Jesus traces His human lineage to Abraham. Often it is necessary to consider a number of scriptures to get to the truth.

I hope this helps.

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You say "that the reason christians BELIEVE" & then you give an answer based totally on a christian understanding, without explaining how you ARRIVE at that understanding. A muslim could claim that they believe that the verse is about the prophet Muhammad coming to crush false prophets, which is why the Quran is the final revelation of God. Unless you can provide REASONING for interpreting the verse the way that you do, then why should any reasonable person interpret it any other way to that which is written.
I give MY full reasoning here (please click the top link below as it takes you to my response to somebody else):


If you as a Christian can not give logical reasons to reinterpret the text, then it should be read plainly, as it is written, WITHOUT reinterpretation.

Please respond to my reasoning by clicking the link above, & tell me where I am wrong.